Red and Yellow Make Orange: A PRSW22 Challenge
by SKJC
Summary: Shane and Dustin for the Power Rangers Slash Write 22 themes. I will eventually hopefully do all 22. Contains slash, duh? Rating hike for chapter 12.
1. theme 8: Friendship

**Notes** - Shane and Dustin won't get the hell out of my head! For the PRSW22.Tori's POV.

**Warnings** - Implied slash. Do I have to warn for that? I don't own these characters because if I did, this would be canon.

theme #8 - friendship

Boys Are Stupid (Throw Rocks At Them)

--

You know, when you're the only girl in the middle of a bunch of guys, you learn a lot. I thought I learned everything I'd ever know about them from spending my whole life surfing - I mean, we all know how many females there are in action sports.

When Blake and Hunter showed up, and Dustin suddenly had new friends, Shane was like a lost puppy. You should have heard the way he whined to me. I still think the reason he didn't like them at first was because they took Dustin away from him back then, all suspicious behavior notwithstanding.

I think he was a little jealous of Hunter, especially. Me and Blake kind of clicked from the start, but Hunter and Dustin were together at the track so much, it made Shane crazy. He started making excuses to go down there, which got out of hand pretty quickly - I'm amazed Shane can handle his Tsunami Cycle, because he's a disaster on a dirtbike. His next strategy was trying to get Dustin to hang out with him at the skate park, but we know from experience that Dustin and skateboards are a pretty catastrophic combination too.

Once the Thunders came back, and Hunter started making eyes at Cam all the time, Shane's attitude towards him did a complete 180, but Hunter and Cam are a whole other batch of clueless that I just don't have the energy for. And of course, Shane and Hunter still have their ridiculous alpha male rivalry going on, but that's just one of those inevitable guy things. It's a good thing the other guys aren't as bad as they are, or the testosterone would be unbearable.

Now, Shane and Dustin are my best friends - have been for a long time - but they're idiots. They danced around each other for ages, but I don't know when they went from friends to more than that. If I had to make a bet, though, seemed like things changed for them after Marah double-crossed Dustin. I still can't believe she would take advantage of him like that, after he trusted her - after he was the only one who WOULD trust her! Shane was unbelievably mad - you could almost see the smoke coming out of his ears. But his presence was the only thing that eased the hurt in Dustin's eyes for a while after that. The casual glances got less casual, the hugs and slaps on the back got more frequent and lasted longer. They sat closer together and hung out alone together a lot more often. And there was no more of the attempting to share activities, which was a good thing, since it'd be pretty hard for either of them to fight Kelzacs with a broken neck.

Things aren't going to get any easier for any of us. Who knows what the future has in store? Lothor is still out there. We have a responsibility to the captive ninjas, and to protect everyone. Somehow we're going to make it through, though. We've got each other, and the bond we share is stronger than any element, any ninja skill, any ranger power.

I guess we'll take it a day at a time.

--


	2. theme 18: Rock

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Set after All About Beevil.

**Warnings** - Boys kissing. Still not mine.

theme #18 - rock

After All is Said and Done (I'll Be There)

--

Dustin knocked on the door of the Clarkes' house. After the day he just finished having, he seriously just wanted to hang out with one of the few people he knew he could trust. At least he got his bike back, but he still felt like a complete idiot, and ditching work to ride until the sun set and the track employees made him go home hadn't made him feel nearly as good as it usually did.

'As long as you're a good person, that's what really counts.' His own words echoed in his head. He knew it was true, but he was kind of sick of being a good person. The door opened.

"Hey, man," Shane greeted him. "What brings you here, you trash the new engine in your bike already?"

"Track closes at dark," Dustin sighed, following him inside.

Shane yelled to his parents in the dining room that he and Dustin were going up to his room to watch TV, and they trekked upstairs.

When they were settled, with the TV on just loud enough to prevent parental eavesdropping, Shane turned his gaze on his friend. "You look miserable," he observed, a hint of sadness to the tone of his voice. He hated seeing his friend in pain. Dustin looked down at the floor, intently studying a mis-colored spot on the carpet.

"I dunno, dude. I always believed it's better to trust people, and that there's some good in everybody. I mean, I know there's bad people out there - I just feel so stupid. I really believed in Marah, you know, and she totally took advantage of that." He cringed and shook his head.

Shane sat down next to him and put an arm around his shoulders. "Don't let it get you down." He let Dustin lean into him and ran the fingers of one hand through his friend's hair softly - in the back of his head, it occurred to him that maybe that wasn't an appropriate 'friend' gesture, but he shrugged it off. "I know you liked her, but don't let this mess with your head. The way you trust people is part of who you are and it's something we all love about you, man."

Dustin looked up. "I didn't like her.. I mean, I liked her, but I didn't LIKE her, dude, seriously." He paused for a moment. "I just wanted to believe in her, like I believe in everybody." He felt Shane nod wordlessly and hug him tighter, and he twisted into the embrace, reclining against Shane's chest.

"I'm not going to let anybody hurt you again," Shane's soft voice broke the silence after a few minutes. "I'm always gonna be here, okay? And I'm gonna protect you, because you're a good person. Don't let Marah, or anybody, make you doubt that - or make you think it could ever be a bad thing."

Dustin took a moment to process the words. He didn't need protecting and Shane knew it as well as he did. But the feeling of being cared about made him smile anyway. He thought about the situation. Shane was holding him, telling him he wanted to protect him, making him feel loved. Dustin decided to go with his gut feeling on this one, and turned his head up to kiss Shane softly.

While Dustin was kissing him, Shane's brain was contemplating exactly what had just happened. He knew it wasn't exactly normal for best friends to cuddle in bed like this, regardless of the circumstances, but he wasn't the one pushing it further this time. Finally he gathered himself enough to kiss back, leaning their foreheads together and searching his friend's expressive eyes for any hint of ... anything, really.

"I told you I didn't like her," Dustin muttered, a slightly lopsided grin on his face. "But you've always been here for me. It just took me until now to figure that out, I guess."

Shane was happier than he could put into words to see that smile again. It was the only expression that really suited his friend's sunny disposition. "And I'm always gonna be," he replied, stroking his fingers down the side of Dustin's face. "If it's up to me, you're never gonna be sad or lonely again."

--


	3. theme 19: Safety

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Set during Down and Dirty, after Dustin lands that freestyle trick on his face, but before the scenes where Hunter and Blake are complaining to Shane and Tori, respectively.

**Warnings** - Still slash, still not mine.

theme #19 - safety

Calculated Risk (And Other Oxymorons)

--

After the race, Kelly drove Dustin and Blake to their respective homes so they could shower and change clothes. "And don't be late for work!" she warned Dustin as he jumped out of the van. "You sure you're all right?"

"Yeah, Kel, I'm fine," he replied. "I'll be there in an hour, promise."

Two hours later, he ran into Storm Chargers. Hunter was stocking shelves with a scowl on his face while Blake and Tori watched what appeared to be a video from the race. Kelly looked up from the register and shook her head. 'He gets more punctual every year,' she thought, 'maybe by the time he's thirty, he'll be on time.' She sighed. 'And now he wants to kill himself doing freestyle demo. Oh brother.'

"Hey," he greeted her, dumping his backpack behind the counter. "Uh, sorry, my dad wanted to know how the demo went, and then I took a really long shower.." Kelly held up a hand to stop the explanation.

"It's fine, Dustin," she said. "Just get going, there's a backlog of mechanical work to get done, okay?" She handed him a clipboard with work orders on it.

"Yeah, no worries," he replied, grinning. She really was the best boss ever.

He was changing the oil in one of the rental bikes when Shane showed up, and he waved, coming out from behind the counter to pull him into a quick, one-armed embrace.

"How was the race?" Shane asked.

"Kelly's crew got video," Dustin replied, "but Blake and Hunter were awesome, as usual. Hunter's mad about what he thinks was a bad pass, though, so steer clear of him unless you really wanna hear about how dirty a racer Blake is."

Shane cringed. When those two fought, they really fought, and he totally didn't wanna get in the middle of that. "So, let's check out that video," he commented, heading towards the lounge area where Blake and Tori were sitting. Dustin followed. It wasn't like the bikes weren't still gonna be there in a few minutes, right?

"... You see! That was totally a clean pass!" Blake exclaimed, pointing at the TV screen.

"I see we're just in time for the good part," Dustin remarked.

"He's only been rewinding it for ten minutes already," Tori complained. "I'm sick of watching that pass." She grabbed the remote control from Blake and sat on it.

"Well, next is the freestyle demo, and I dunno if Dustin wants to re-live that landing," Blake cracked. Tori rolled her eyes.

"Shut up, dude, I'd like to see you pull tricks like that." Dustin gestured to the video as the first rider landed his trick perfectly.

"Sorry man, I'm not crazy," Blake shot back.

Shane frowned. "You're doing freestyle again?" He asked.

Dustin ran a greasy hand through his hair. "I dunno, dude, I kinda miss it. It's like I told Kelly, I don't want to choose between freestyle and racing."

"Hey, here's Dustin's jump," Blake exclaimed, pointing again. They all watched, wincing as he hit the ground and rolled like a ragdoll. "The jump was sick, bro, but you seriously gotta watch that landing."

Dustin grinned sheepishly. "Hey, it could have gone worse."

"Yeah, you only could have gotten killed," Shane interjected sarcastically. "I mean, what's the big deal?" He knew he was coming off more angry than he actually intended but watching that crash worried him.

"Shane!" Tori admonished him. "He's fine, relax!"

"Seriously, man, the EMTs at the track checked him over and Kelly wouldn't have let him come to work if he was hurt," Blake added.

Dustin cringed. He knew why their overprotective leader was upset. "Can we talk? In the back?" He asked, looking Shane in the eye. Tori and Blake shared a 'why don't we know what's going on' glance.

Shane followed the yellow-clad boy into the stockroom without comment. They ushered Hunter out with promises to listen to his side of the bad pass story in a bit. Shane was the first to speak once the door was shut.

"Why do you even want to do that kind of thing?" he demanded. "I know nothing's risk-free but at least racing isn't blatantly suicidal!"

"Like nothing you do is dangerous," Dustin shot back. "Just as many people get hurt doing skate tricks as they do in moto!"

"It's calculated risk, man!" Shane shouted. "I don't do big air events!"

"Look, I'm sorry I didn't tell you I wanted to go back to freestyle," Dustin sighed. "It's just because I knew you'd freak out and get all protective."

"With good reason!" Shane's tone softened a bit as he took in the apologetic expression on Dustin's face. "I'm only protective because I..." he paused, "I care about you a lot. I want you to be safe."

"I know that, dude. But I really love freestyle. And I don't throw tricks I'm not at least reasonably sure I can land. How long did you train that front-side 540 before you could actually stay on your board?"

"I never got hurt!"

"Well, neither did I."

"Yet," Shane grumbled. He knew he was losing this argument and it was rather annoying, but he really didn't have a leg to stand on.

"Same goes for you. Unless you're planning to quit skateboarding, that is." Dustin took Shane's hand in his own and squeezed. "I promise I'm gonna be careful, but this is what I want to do."

"You're sure?" Shane asked, a defeated tone to his voice, searching Dustin's eyes for sincerity.

"Absolutely, man." Dustin smiled widely, his eyes sparking, and Shane sighed. There was absolutely no way he could argue with that. He ran his fingers through Dustin's mop of hair, a gesture that had long since become a habit for him.

"It'd kill me if anything happened to you, you know," he murmured, bringing their clasped hands to his lips and kissing each of Dustin's fingertips.

"We'll just have to make sure it doesn't," came the reply. Any further commentary was interrupted by a loud banging at the door.

"Why's this door locked?" Kelly shouted from outside. "And why's there a bike with a half-disassembled engine sitting out here?"

Dustin's eyes widened. "Dude, I gotta get back to work. Making Kelly mad is worse for your health than any moto event."

Shane laughed. "Have fun. I'll talk to Hunter. He's gonna go nuts if we don't give him something to yell at."

--


	4. theme 20: Thrill

**Notes** - For the PRSW22, followup to 'Calculated Risk,' set post-series. These aren't actually gonna be in chronological order from here on out - I'll timeline them all when I'm finished. This one was actually the one that gave me the idea to do these fics. :o Also, I don't ride FMX, but I have been an EMT at a track, so the tricks I describe here, I got from various webpages - I think a cordova is what you see Dustin doing in the first episode, and the trick he does at the Action Games at the end looks like a "Superman Seat Grab" - but as far as I know people call this stuff whatever they want anyway. :D

**Warnings** - Still slash, still not mine. As noted, probable inaccuracies when it comes to FMX tricks. Possible but less likely medical inaccuracies.

theme #20 - thrill

Go Big (Or Go Home)

--

Dustin was bored. The Action Games had been awesome, but that was months ago, and he found himself becoming more and more aware of how boring being a teacher at a secret ninja academy could actually be. Which was funny, because it really didn't sound like a boring job at all. He still worked at Storm Chargers in his free time - it wasn't like being a sensei was more demanding than being a Power Ranger - and Kelly still supported him on the motocross track.

Hunter dropped by practically every day, except the days Cam made the trip to the Thunder Academy instead. Tori was never far from her cell phone, in case Blake decided to call. Meanwhile, Dustin thought, he and Shane were sharing one of the sets of family quarters in the teachers' building. Funny how things turn out. It wasn't that quiet domesticity disagreed with him, but he was definitely getting restless. He checked his schedule for the day - Cam had forced him to nail it to the wall of their living room, citing numerous instances of failing to make it anywhere on time - and realized he actually didn't have an afternoon class today.

'Awesome,' he thought. 'I'll go hit the track for a while.' Thinking for a second, he grabbed a pen and a sheet of paper from the counter and scrawled, '_Going to the track, call if you need anything. - D.' _He looked at it a couple times, determined Shane would probably be able to read it - his lover was busy teaching a swordwork class - and stuck it on the small refrigerator with one of the stupid joke magnets that Hunter gave him for Christmas, that read "I'm not gay but my boyfriend is." Apparently, the Crimson Ranger thought that slogan was incredibly hilarious.

He tossed his training uniform over the side of a chair and grabbed a jumpsuit, shimmying into it and looking around for his helmet and gear. He located the muddy duffel bag under one end of the couch and dug out the boots and body armor, tying them on hurriedly, and grabbing the helmet in one hand.

Dustin kept his bike in one of the storage sheds on the school grounds, which drove Cam insane, as he had the tendency to work on it rather late at night. The ride to and from school was too much fun for him to give up and keep his bike at Storm Chargers, though. The forest was just a natural obstacle course. He jogged out to the shed, trying to keep a low profile - which wasn't easy when you're wearing bright yellow motocross gear at a ninja school - the last thing he needed was for someone to have found something important for him to do.

--

After a five-lap warmup practice run, he propped his bike against the fence to grab a drink of water, and his cell phone rang.

"Go for Dustin," he answered, grinning. Regular people thought he was nuts for answering the phone like that. His friends got the joke, although Cam didn't think it was that funny. His parents chalked it up to being just another personality quirk.

"Yo, dude, how's it hanging?" It was Blake, laughter in his voice. Dustin blinked.

"I'm cool, man, but this isn't Tori's phone," he replied.

"She's probably teaching a class, I just called her and left a message."

"Sounds good. So, what's the occasion? You don't usually take time out of your pro racing career to chat with us little guys," Dustin joked, switching the phone to his other ear.

Blake chuckled. "Actually, racing's why I'm calling. I'm racing that series down in San Diego next weekend and they're doing a big freestyle show. I showed them footage of you from the Action Games and they told me to invite you."

"Seriously?" Dustin asked incredulously.

"Absolutely. I already talked to Hunter, you guys can come down together. He's going to try to talk Cam into going. Bring Shane too, if he's not busy. I'll get everybody pit passes."

"So we're just assuming Tori's going to drive us, I guess?" Dustin joked. He knew she would - it was a chance to see Blake, she'd drive her old van across the country if she had to. San Diego wasn't even that far.

Blake laughed. "I'm gonna talk to her. If she can't come, Hunter will bring you guys in his truck."

"All of us? Is Cam gonna sit in his lap while he drives?" The mental image made Dustin giggle even as he was saying it.

There was a groan from the other end of the line. "Dude, don't make me think about stuff like that, okay? One of you can ride in the back with the bikes or something."

"Back of a pickup all the way to San Diego?" Dustin asked. "That could be fun."

"Well, whatever, it's up to you," Blake remarked. "Hey, I'm getting another call, it's probably Tor. Anyway, so I'll see you there?"

"Totally, man," Dustin replied. "Later." He flipped the phone shut and grinned widely. Yeah, this was totally what he needed to break the monotony lately.

--

After dark that evening, he parked his bike back in the storage shed at the Academy and shuffled back to the teachers' building, scuffed up, covered in mud, his hair messy from wearing a helmet for hours, and limping slightly. After Blake's call, he'd spent the entire afternoon throwing tricks on the ramps, and he was definitely a little bruised up from the ones that didn't go as well as he'd hoped. The ones that did, though, had made him pretty happy with himself.. He just wasn't looking forward to explaining the bruises to Shane.

They'd worked out their differences of opinion about Dustin doing FMX, but Shane still hated seeing his lover come home from the track all banged up. 'Maybe I can blame it on Blake somehow,' Dustin thought to himself as he opened the door. 'I mean, if he hadn't called, I'd probably have just run laps all afternoon.' But that probably wasn't a good way to convince Shane to go Blake's race San Diego with him, he realized. At least if he didn't want Shane to kill Blake, which would inevitably upset both Tori and Hunter, and thus Cam by association. He had to live with these people, after all.

"Hey," Shane greeted him, accompanied by a quick kiss and a hug. Dustin winced slightly, failing to hide it, and the other ninja eyed him suspiciously. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he replied, "Uh, I just crashed a couple times during practice. Bruises, nothing that won't heal on it's own, you know?"

"You're working the ramp again, aren't you?" Shane wanted to know.

Dustin ran a hand through his hair. "Well, yeah. Blake called, told me about this race in San Diego next weekend he's doing. They saw a tape of me from the Action Games and want me in their freestyle demo... So I figured I'd practice some new tricks, perfect some old ones, see what I wanna throw down out there.." He trailed off.

Shane shook his head and sighed. He wasn't going to have this argument again. "If that's what you wanna do."

"It is. And I want you to come with me," Dustin added. "Hunter's going, he's gonna drag Cam, and Tori's gonna drive us. You practically have to come," he pleaded, turning on the puppy-dog eyes.

"Did Tori already agree to this?"

"Dude, I dunno. She called Blake back while I was talking to him. But you seriously think she won't?" Dustin sat down, pulling off his boots and protective armor and packing them back into the duffel bag he had left on the floor, grimacing as sore muscles complained about the movement.

"That's a good point," Shane agreed. "Go take a shower. I'll give you a massage after dinner, but not if you're still covered in mud." He smirked.

"I'm totally gonna hold you to that, dude."

--

A week and a half later, they were piling out of Tori's van in the rocky parking lot at a dirt track outside San Diego.

"We gotta go register," Hunter noted after they unloaded the bikes from the back of the van. "Catch up with you guys later?" He addressed Cam, Shane, and Tori.

"I'm gonna go find Blake," Tori replied, scanning the crowd for Factory Blue banners, signs, or uniforms.

"Of course," Hunter grinned. "Tell my bro I'm gonna kick his butt on the track."

"You're racing the same class as the factory pros?" Dustin asked. He knew Hunter was good, but not entirely sure if he was THAT good.

"Why not? Besides, it's not like I get to race Blake anymore," Hunter complained. "It's for fun, and I don't care if I win or not."

"Good thing," Dustin cracked, and Hunter punched him in the shoulder.

--

After the first set of races - the kids, women's, and intermediate classes - a call came over the loudspeakers for the freestyle demonstrators to take their lineup, because the demos would start shortly. The pro class racing was for the late afternoon - Dustin figured the demo was how they'd get everybody pumped up for the serious motos.

He wheeled his bike into the pit staging area and watched the crew finish inspecting the ramp while he looked over the crowd for his friends. Shane was tall enough to be relatively visible, and he stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled sharply, waving.

"First rider up!" The pit coordinator yelled, and a young guy, a couple years Dustin's junior, wearing black and red and riding a tricked out 250, took the center of the arena, revving his bike's engine loudly. Dustin watched as he pulled a "Lazy Boy," reclining flat on his bike in mid-air, and hitting the landing perfectly with no hands - instead, he threw up devil horns to the crowd, who laughed and cheered.

"Next rider up!" Came the call as the first guy returned to the pit, after a lap around the crowd for congratulatory high-fives. This one was a tall, skinny girl on a purple Suzuki. She looked out at the crowd, flashing a V-for-victory sign, and she got awesome air for her huge backflip, wavered on the landing but managed to get control. 'Wow, I gotta go on after these guys?' he thought. 'Tough acts to follow.' He had been planning to pull his own variant on a cordova, since he could do those in his sleep, but now he wasn't sure that was even remotely flashy enough.

"Next rider up!" Dustin gave the guy a thumbs-up, pulling his helmet on and riding out into the arena. 'Maybe I should pull a one-handed Superman grab. I landed one with both hands at the Action Games, anyway, and that's why they wanted me here!' He ran through the trick in his mind as be gunned the bike's engine.

"Yeah! Go Dustin!" Tori was screaming, and he could pick Shane's deeper voice out cheering him on from the crowd as well. He glanced over and noticed even Cam watching with some amount of interest. 'Yeah, okay. I'm gonna go for it,' he decided, squaring himself and hitting the throttle.

He hit the top of the ramp, going airborne and extending his body out behind the bike, bringing both hands down to the seat and pulling his left arm out into the air so his right hand on the seat was the only contact with the bike. He rotated his legs down quickly to try and re-straddle the seat without losing the hand contact.

When he hit the landing ramp, though, the front wheel skidded sideways, and he only had one hand back on the handlebars yet, so he couldn't pull it back the other way. The bike came out from under him, skidding down the ramp and across the arena, and he slammed into the ramp not even halfway down, sliding limply down into the dirt. A collective groan rang out from the crowd, some of the other riders wincing sympathetically - they knew what that felt like.

Shane's heart stopped. Dustin wasn't moving. Medical techs ran out onto the field, and his brain was telling him to go out there too, but his body wouldn't move. Tori gasped as they watched two EMTs log-roll Dustin's unconscious form into a supine position on flat ground, and another uniformed figure came running with a backboard and collar.

The announcer's voice rose over the din of all the riders and spectators talking at once. "Wow, kids, don't try that one at home!" Shane glared angrily in the direction of the booth with the loudspeakers.

"Dude, even if looks could kill, the guy'd have to see you," Hunter commented, putting one hand on Shane's shoulder.

"He's still not moving," Shane observed helplessly as an ambulance drove up onto the track. One of the EMT's held Dustin's head steady while the other two carefully removed his helmet in a joint effort, put the plastic immobilization collar around his neck, and set about securing him to the backboard with some orange straps.

"You want me to find out where they're gonna take him?" Blake offered. Shane nodded wordlessly, and the blue-clad racer ran out onto the field, flashing his pro badge at the officials as he questioned one of the EMTs. A minute later, he ran back over to the others. "Dude, they said one of us can go with him," he explained, looking at Shane. "You should. They're going to Angel of Mercy Hospital, about 8 miles up the highway."

"We'll follow you," Tori chimed in, and Shane nodded again and ran out onto the track. "Sorry, Blake, we're gonna miss your race," she continued. She knew he wouldn't be allowed to skip out on his races - the managers would have a fit.

"No worries," he replied, waving at the officials to okay Shane's presence. "I'll be there right after the moto."

"Good luck, bro," Hunter said, gathering up their stuff. "For once I'm glad I don't ride factory." Blake watched his friends run off towards Tori's van to follow the ambulance, and sighed. 'Guess I better go warm up,' he thought.

--

Shane had been pacing back and forth for ten minutes already when the others arrived, not having the right to break traffic laws like an emergency vehicle. The ER doctors had thrown him out of the treatment room pretty much immediately since he wasn't a relative, and they'd had to threaten to call security to actually get him to go peacefully.

"I'm going to take a wild guess and say you've been doing that since you got here," Cam remarked. "Sit down before you wear a rut in the floor."

"No, dude, you don't get it." Shane stopped to look at his friends. "That was NOT the trick he practiced for this. I'd bet anything he changed it at the last minute after he saw what everybody else was doing."

Hunter nodded. "He was talking about doing some variant trick he made up. That wasn't it." Just because he didn't do freestyle didn't mean he didn't understand the competitive mindset - racers would take big risks just as well.

"I've been telling him for almost a year that he's going to kill himself with this stuff!"

"Shane," Tori interjected gently, "I know you care about Dustin, but this is what he loves to do."

Cam agreed. "I can't say I actually see the fun in all the things any of you do, but stuff like this just happens. I guarantee you, this isn't going to put him off his desire to do freestyle - the thrill is in the danger, as they say."

"Who says that?" Hunter wanted to know. Cam rolled his eyes.

"It's just a saying, Hunter."

"Dude, I'd still race moto even if it was perfectly safe. That's a stupid saying."

"You guys aren't helping," Tori observed, as Shane finally sat down, leaning forward with his head in his hands. "Did they say anything yet, Shane?"

"No," he mumbled. "He was unconscious the whole way here and they wouldn't even let me in the room. They promised they'd let me know as soon as they brought him back from radiology."

"Did you call his parents?" Cam asked.

Shane shook his head. "I wanted to wait until there's something to tell them - 'hey, just so you know, your son might have broken his neck' isn't really a great phone call."

--

Two hours later, which felt like an eternity, a nurse came calling for Dustin's family.

Shane bolted out of his chair, practically running the woman over. "We're down for a motocross race, so his family's not here. Just us." He gestured anxiously at the waiting group. "But he's over eighteen anyway, does it matter?"

"No," she replied, "but if you could give us their contact information we'll call them - where are you from?"

"Blue Bay Harbor," Shane answered. "I was gonna call them when I found out if he's okay."

"Come with me. The doctor will fill you in." She gestured down the hallway, and he followed without question. He'd go wherever he had to for somebody to tell him something.

The nurse led him into one of the rooms, where Dustin was propped up in a hospital bed, with a tall young woman in a white coat making notes on his chart.

"Hey, buddy," he greeted Shane weakly, glad they'd finally listened to him and let his lover see him - he'd only been bugging them since he woke up, and that took a lot of energy when you felt like a train ran over you. "You're gonna yell at me now, aren't you?" He half-smiled, running his left hand through his hair - the right was encased in plaster from hand to shoulder and in a sling.

"I already yelled at everybody else, I think you're off the hook," Shane replied, anger and anxiety dissipating somewhat as he observed Dustin's condition. He was more upset at the situation than at Dustin specifically, anyway. "What's the verdict?" He addressed the doctor, who was obviously amused by the exchange.

"Well, let's see." She looked at the chart. "Four broken ribs, all on the right side, broken clavicle, also on the right, right wrist and forearm are broken, right shoulder was dislocated, and to top it off, a concussion and a good case of whiplash." She looked Dustin up and down. "Give it at least eight weeks for the bones to heal before you try jumping motorcycles again, okay?"

"Absolutely," he replied. "Do I have to stay here?"

"We'll call your parents and let them know, but I'd prefer it if you did."

"He lives with me," Shane interrupted, "and some of our friends are very close by. Same building. We can take him home." As far as she knew, he was talking about an apartment, not the teachers' quarters of a ninja school.

"Yeah," Dustin agreed. "I hate hospitals so I'd really rather just go home if that's okay. If you could still call my parents that'd be cool, though. My dad rides, he'll get it, but mom's nuts and I totally don't have the energy to talk to her."

The doctor looked at him skeptically. "Half your body's wrapped in pressure bandages and plaster, but if you really feel up to going home, that's up to you. I'll make up the discharge papers and write you a prescription for some pain management."

Shane wrote down the Brooks' phone number for her. "This is his parents' house," he explained, and she took the paper, promising to make the phone call and come back to get them out of her ER as soon as she could.

As soon as the door closed, Dustin was talking. "Dude, please don't say 'I told you so,' alright?"

Shane sat down heavily in the horrible little plastic chair by the bed. "I'm not going to," he sighed. "It's obvious that you already know." He reached for Dustin's uninjured hand, holding it in both of his own, contemplating how fragile the other boy seemed, paler than usual under his dark, messy hair.

"That you're smarter than me? Duh." Dustin laughed, then grimaced as he came to the abrupt conclusion that laughing at your own jokes when you had broken ribs hurt.

Shane winced sympathetically. "You're still going to do freestyle." It wasn't really a question.

"Of course. Dude, if I quit riding the first time I got hurt, I would have never gotten out of the beginner classes."

"You still gonna have the guts for it after this?" Shane asked. "No offense, but that was a pretty bad crash, man. Lots of people get cold feet after something like that."

"Well, you heard the doc, I gotta give it a couple months before I can even try to ride again. I'll get it back together by then." He paused. "Besides, if it was totally safe, it wouldn't nearly as much fun!"

"You must have different motivations than Hunter. Cam said the exact same thing, and Hunter told him that was a stupid saying - he'd still race even if it was totally safe."

"That's not the point, dude," Dustin explained. "How would you make it safe? It'd be boring! You'd have to, like, seriously limit speeds and jump heights and track conditions, and all kinds of other dumb stuff. It'd be like racing pee-wee class your whole career. Hunter probably means, like, if they found some way to keep it exactly how it is now, but put, like, forcefields around everybody or something." He thought about that for a second. "Dude, that'd actually be pretty cool," he added as an afterthought, nodding to himself. "That would definitely be awesome, maybe Cam could figure out how to do it. It'd be like bumper-cars combined with moto!"

"Oh, God." Shane shook his head. "Cam is not going to program you portable forcefields for motocross."

"Dude, if I tell Hunter about my idea, I'm sure he'll help me convince him!" Dustin looked like he was pretty sure Hunter wouldn't be adverse to this idea, especially if it involved giving him a good reason to grope Cam.

"It's the painkillers talking, bro. This won't seem like nearly as good of an idea when you're off the morphine."

--


	5. theme 6: Family

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Semi-followup to 'After All Is Said And Done' and not related to any episodes.

**Warnings** - If you're offended by slash and you read my fanfic I really wonder if you're some sort of masochist, and if I owned this stuff it'd probably be a lot more interesting but a lot less popular.

theme 6 - family

What Is Love? (And Other Annoying Questions)

--

Shane was thinking about Dustin again. Not that this was an unusual occurrence, as the list of other things he thought about on a regular basis was pretty short - the other Rangers, skateboarding and his ninja training made up the largest part of it.

These days, though, he was finding himself on the topic of Dustin even more than before they had - what, he wondered, started dating? They didn't go on dates, unless hanging out with their friends and then going to Pizza Hut counted. Shane kind of doubted that would count as a date even if everyone else wasn't around. They hung out more often by themselves, and those times had gotten a lot more interesting - they hadn't gone very far yet, but Shane felt his cheeks redden as he thought of some of the more creative things Dustin had come up with.

Sleeping together wouldn't be a completely incorrect description of their relationship, as they spent as many nights as possible wrapped around each other in one or the other's bed, but Shane knew that the implication in that phrase was that it was about sex - which they weren't, in the strictest sense, having - and not at all about the fact that they loved one another.

'Do I love him?' He thought abruptly. They'd been friends forever, and Shane knew he felt far more strongly for Dustin than any other friend he'd ever had, but what did he know about love? The over-dramatic pictures of relationships in TV and movies were totally not applicable to them at all - he'd even downloaded a couple of episodes of 'Queer as Folk' off the internet, and had come to the conclusion that if he ever acted like the guys on that show, he hoped Dustin would punch him.

He thought about talking to Tori, but thought better of it. She was usually pretty together, but he had a feeling from the way she acted around Blake that she really didn't have much more of a clue on this topic than he did. Not to mention it wouldn't be worth answering the inevitable series of complicated questions. He lumped the other Rangers into the same category; too clueless as well as too nosy. Sensei was completely out; Shane couldn't even fathom asking for relationship advice from the man in human form, much less as a guinea pig.

That left Shane's family. His brother would lecture him for an hour before he'd even listen, and since Porter hadn't had a girlfriend since junior high, Shane doubted his advice would even be that useful. Their father was just as critical of him as Porter was, so he pretty quickly decided against that too. That left one person...

--

"Mom, can I talk to you?"

Mrs. Clarke looked up from the dishes. "I would welcome it, dear," she replied with a smile. "You're so busy with your friends these days that I never get to see you." She turned off the tap and picked up a towel to dry her hands.

Shane cleared his throat nervously. "I was just wondering.. This is kind of a weird question. But you and Dad have been married for like, thirty years or something, right?"

"Thirty-two this fall," she corrected, nodding.

"Okay, yeah," Shane continued. "So, um... You love him, right?"

"Yes, of course... Is this line of questioning going somewhere specific?" She asked, amused.

Shane blinked. "Uh, I just wanted to know... Like, how do you know when you love somebody? I mean, it seems really vague and everything.." he trailed off.

Mrs. Clarke raised an eyebrow at her son. 'They grow up far too fast,' she contemplated. He was in pre-school practically yesterday and now he was practically a grown man, standing in her kitchen asking her how to tell if he was in love. "Well, dear.. To tell you the truth, it's very hard to explain," she began. "I think the best way I can put it, is that loving another person means that their happiness is more important to you than your own."

Shane thought about that for a moment. It made sense, but he still wasn't sure. "There's got to be more to it than that, though?" He asked anxiously.

His mother laughed. "Dear, you're overanalyzing this.. Of course, there's a lot more to it. All of the things you have to have with someone to be their best friend, you still have to have to love them - mutual trust, respect, support. That's one of the reasons why this is such a difficult question to answer." She hugged Shane briefly, wondering whether or not commenting on her gut feeling was appropriate, and decided to go with it. "Don't worry so much. Things like this, you learn by experience. And I'm sure things with you and Dustin will fall into place eventually." She winked, smiling innocently at the mortified expression on Shane's face.

"I... I... Did I say that?" He stuttered, suddenly finding the floor a lot more interesting.

"I'm your mother, sweetheart," Mrs. Clarke replied, her eyes twinkling. "I'm not an idiot."

--


	6. theme 9: Hallways

**Notes** - The 'no kissing in ninja ops' rule is so commonplace that I really dunno who did it first, but come on, it's totally a rule Cam would enact. For the PRSW22.

**Warnings** - Not my sandbox, I just play here. Slash.

theme #9 - hallways

New Rule (To Preserve Cam's Sanity)

--

There was once a time, Cam reflected, when his life was peaceful, relatively uncomplicated, and he wasn't completely surrounded by idiots.

Unfortunately that had ended when his father had been turned into a guinea pig and he now had to deal with five teenagers every day. He sighed, pondering all the turns of events which could have possibly led to his Red and Yellow Rangers making out in the hallway outside the Zord bay, and cleared his throat,

Shane had Dustin pinned against the wall with his larger frame, one knee between Dustin's legs, his right hand tangled in the shaggy hair as he ravished the earth ninja's mouth, the other hand inside the back of Dustin's uniform vest. For his part, Dustin didn't seem to be objecting to the treatment, but neither of them noticed Cam.

He cleared his throat again, louder. Either they were really caught up in each other or they were blatantly ignoring him. Cam almost hoped for the former, as the latter would almost certainly imply they didn't care that he could see them. Some ninjas, though, letting their guard down like that. "Excuse me!" He shouted.

That worked. Shane jumped half a foot in the air, and Dustin grinned cheekily, waving at the tech. "Hey, dude," he greeted Cam casually, like the green-clad young man hadn't just caught him with Shane's tongue down his throat. "Uh, we didn't know you were here."

"I live here, Dustin," Cam deadpanned. "Where else would I be?"

"Sorry, Cam," Shane apologized, but it was undercut by the fact that he didn't look particularly apologetic while flushed and breathing hard.

--

The next day, there was a sign on the wall that read "No Kissing In Ninja Ops." Cam had a heck of a time explaining it to his father, but it worked. Mostly.

That is, until the time he found them half-dressed and making out in Shane's Zord, and Dustin tried to use the excuse that the rule didn't specify whether or not the Zord bay counted as part of Ninja Ops. Cam took a lot of aspirin that day.

That argument was never settled, and so the sign was amended to read "No Kissing ANYWHERE In Ninja Ops," with "including the Zord bay" scrawled underneath in Dustin's messy handwriting.

--


	7. theme 2: Atmosphere

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. No actual timeline on this one.

**Warnings** - Just the usual - Slash, sexuality, standard copyright disclaimer.

theme 2 - atmosphere

Under the Weather (Or Maybe Over It)

--

Dustin didn't pay attention to an awful lot of stuff. The running joke was that if you told him something, he'd realize it a week later. But when he did decide to pay attention, he'd notice the strangest things.

Like how the weather influenced Shane's mood. Dustin hated gray, rainy days as much as the next guy, but a long stretch of bad weather would get Shane seriously disoriented.

Dustin figured it had something to do with the ninja elements. The changes had gotten more pronounced when they started ninja training, and even more when they got the Ranger powers - he'd been paying attention for longer than he'd let on. One time, he asked Cam about it, and gotten a lecture about atmospheric pressure and how air ninjas were easily affected by its changes. He had started watching the Weather Channel after that.

Of course, before they'd gotten together, he'd never had the opportunity before to observe some of the more interesting effects, like how a lightning storm would get Shane worked up enough to pin him to his bed and practically devour his body with an intensity Dustin had totally not been expecting.

However, it had been a challenge for them to even get to bed - as soon as the bedroom door had shut, Dustin had found himself pressed up against it, one of Shane's hands working its way into his jeans and the other pulling impatiently at his shirt as they kissed. Shane had gotten both of their clothes off in what had to be some sort of record time, grinding their bodies together roughly until Dustin had practically shoved him off, breathlessly suggesting the whole bed idea.

The next morning, when he was somewhat recovered, he was extremely apologetic about the bite marks marring Dustin's neck, shoulders, and chest.

"Dude, it's cool," Dustin shrugged it off, stretching out lazily on the bed. "I wasn't complaining at the time, remember?"

"Yeah, but still." Shane gently brushed one finger over one of the angrier-looking bruises on Dustin's collarbone. "Geez, it looks like I attacked you or something."

"You practically did," Dustin replied lightly, grinning widely.

Shane ducked his head sheepishly. "Yeah, uh, recently thunderstorms have been having that effect on me for some reason." He ran one hand softly up Dustin's chest. "I mean, it's not like you don't test my self-control on a daily basis anyway, but man, that was intense."

A slight flush tinted Dustin's skin at his lover's blatant appreciation of his body. "Atmospheric pressure," he noted, like that was an explanation by itself.

"Uh, what?" Shane raised an eyebrow.

"That's what Cam said. About how the weather messes with your head," Dustin explained. "Uh, not that I asked him about this specifically," he added as an afterthought, chuckling. "Just, y'know, how you get really messed up when it rains for a long time, and stuff."

Shane considered that for a second. "Yeah, I guess that makes sense."

"And it gives me a reason to look forward to thunderstorms," Dustin added, leaning up to catch Shane's lips in a wet, open-mouthed kiss and pulling the taller boy's body down against his. "And the mornings after them."

--


	8. theme 1: Animals

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. The day after 'Sensei Switcheroo,' putting it rather far back on the fic timeline - obviously it's before any of the parts where everybody knows all of everybody else's business. I had the worst time actually WRITING this - the basic idea was easy but putting it into a plot failed horribly. I apologize in advance. xD; (I was going to post this last week but I was leaving for Motocross of Nations and forgot - expect some moto-centric Dustin!fic inspired by the event soon. )

**Warnings** - Slash, standard copyright disclaimer.

theme 1 - animals

Conformity is Overrated (Good Thing We're Freaks)

--

"That CAN'T be normal," Tori commented, eyeing Dustin skeptically.

"Has Dustin ever been normal?" Cam inquired, not looking away from his laptop screen. It was too early in the day for him to deal with the Winds' unique level of weirdness.

"Dude, what? It's so not my fault I'm hungry," Dustin complained, munching on another handful of guinea pig food. "I didn't get to eat breakfast!"

"And you can't have, like, some cereal?" Tori shook her head. "Or a granola bar?"

"Hey, this is kinda like granola," Dustin protested.

"Why didn't you eat at home?" Blake asked. "I mean, we've got an excuse since Hunter's the worst cook alive..."

"Hey!" Hunter obviously took offense at that. Blake laughed at him.

"Uh, I was at Shane's house last night," Dustin explained, "and we massively overslept, so I had to run home and shower or I was gonna be late. Again." He grinned. Of course, the others didn't need to know WHY they overslept.

Tori looked at him questioningly. "Speaking of Shane, and late..." She gestured to the corridor leading out of Ninja Ops. "Where is he?"

"No clue." Dustin tipped another handful of the food into his mouth. "I thought he'd beat me here, y'know?"

"Well, I figured you'd know, since you guys are spending an awful lot of time together lately," Tori noted casually.

Dustin shrugged. "So? You spend a lot of time with Blake," he replied. What was she getting at, exactly?

Cam raised an eyebrow. "That was an interesting choice of analogies, Dustin," he commented, looking up from the computer.

"Dude... I don't know what that means."

"He means that since Tori's dating Blake, comparing the amount of time they spend together to the amount of time you spend with Shane is kind of weird," Hunter explained, and noticed everyone was giving him weird looks. "What? I pay attention," he added defensively. Cam snorted.

Dustin scratched his head. "Uh, whatever, dude." He really didn't have any idea what he was supposed to say.

Hunter smirked. The guy was adorable, it was a shame he didn't have more common sense. "Dude, nobody cares if you and Shane are going out."

"What?" Dustin blinked. "You - wait, what?" He looked around the room, a confused expression on his face. 'Did I just totally miss something?' he wondered.

Tori patted him on the shoulder. "I dunno about them, but I figured you guys out ages ago.

"Uh... It hasn't been ages?" Dustin offered weakly. "Anyway, we.. didn't know what you guys would think, I guess."

"This is the wrong crowd to worry about coming out to - did you totally miss my bro being all over Cam recently?" Blake looked vaguely like he sort of wished he had missed it.

"Uh.." Dustin thought about it for a second, munching on another mouthful of the crunchy pellets. "I dunno. I've been kind of ... uh, preoccupied?"

"There's a shock," Cam deadpanned. He was interrupted before he could comment further.

"What are we talking about?" Shane asked from the entranceway, sounding slightly out of breath. "Sorry, gotta get better at leaving the house late without my parents noticing."

"You could try not leaving late to begin with," Cam suggested with a hint of his usual sarcasm. Shane didn't bother thanking him for the advice.

"We're talking about you and Dustin," Tori replied matter-of-factly. "And maybe you can get him to, I don't know, stop eating Sensei's food for breakfast."

The yellow-clad ninja hid the bag under the table, a guilty, lopsided grin on his face.

"What about me and Dustin?" Shane asked, somewhat nervously.

"Dude, they know, everybody's cool." Dustin reassured him. "Apparently Tori's psychic, and Hunter's been doing Cam for a while or something, too."

Tori smirked knowingly.

"I can't even begin to tell you how much I object to that phrasing." Cam scowled. "I am not a leisure activity."

Hunter started to say something, but obviously thought better of it when he noticed Cam glaring at him over the edge of the laptop screen. Blake looked vaguely traumatized.

"Okay, this is kind of insane," Shane commented, looking back and forth between his teammates. "But why ARE you still eating that crap?" He gestured to the bag of Guinea Pig Chow next to Dustin's foot.

"It's good, dude, don't knock it!"

"Man, I didn't want to eat it when I was in Sensei's body, much less now," Shane teased. "You're a complete freak, you know that?"

"Yeah, but that's why you love me."

--


	9. theme 10: Kissing in the Rain

**Notes**: For the PRSW22 and inspired by my trip to the Motocross of Nations where I camped in a leaky tent surrounded by a bunch of drunken Europeans. Thank god for Xanax and earplugs. xD Since this was handwritten and then typed it actually went through an editing and revision process, unlike most of everything else I write. oo It's also extremely random. Takes place sometime after "General Deception" but before the end of the series.

**Warnings**: Aside from the implications of the prompt? Not mine. :P Oh, a little swearing, too.

theme #10 - kissing in the rain

The Wonders of Duct Tape (It Fixes Everything)

--

"Dude!" Dustin complained, "I seriously thought I put that spray stuff on the tent!"

"Yeah, that worked out really well, didn't it?" Shane grumbled sarcastically. He did not like being woken up at - he glanced at his watch - 1:21 AM with cold water dripping on his head.

"Hey, it wasn't even supposed to rain this weekend!"

Since the team camping trip hadn't exactly worked out the way they'd wanted, Shane and Dustin had planned their own. Except everybody else opted not to come. Something about Murphy's Law making all of them its bitches recently. At least it carried an added bonus of giving them a couple of nights alone, without parents who were starting to question the increased frequency that they'd crash at each other's houses.

Unfortunately, they'd forgotten Dustin's tendency to, well, forget stuff.

Like putting rain sealant on the seams of the tent.

Shane sighed. Dustin was right, the weather forecast had been fine, but he'd still planned on it raining anyway - he could usually predict the weather more accurately than television, and it was just the way stuff usually worked out.

"Come on, dude, it's not that bad. It'll probably stop by morning," Dustin reasoned. He was probably right about that too, it wasn't coming down that hard, but Shane was still a little annoyed.

"At least the sleeping bags are waterproof," he muttered, stretching out on his back again. "Unless it seriously floods we won't get that wet."

"Dude, don't say that, or it'll happen," Dustin pointed out. He was sitting up and fishing through his backpack. Finally, he pulled out a roll of duct tape.

"Nah. I think you're right about it stopping." It actually wasn't that bad. They had just managed to position the rainfly of the tent so some of the dripping had occurred directly over Shane's head.

"Cool. Hey, you said I was right!" Dustin pulled off a length of the tape, tore it with his teeth, and stuck it up on the roof of the tent where the leak was coming in.

"Yeah, only about that." Shane rolled his eyes. His lover enjoyed that way too much. "You still should have put the sealant on the tent. Duct tape isn't a permanent fix."

Dustin laughed. "I know, I know, sorry. But my bike would disagree with you on the duct tape thing."

"Oh, that's why it looks like your handlebars are about to fall off?" Shane teased.

"Nah, dude, just the foot pegs." Dustin tossed the tape back in his backpack and shoved it back into the corner. "Hey, I got an idea!"

Shane raised an eyebrow skeptically.

"Since we're awake anyway... You wanna make out?" Dustin asked, with an air of exaggerated seriousness, which he managed to keep up for about fifteen seconds.

"I can't believe you sometimes," Shane laughed.

"Is that a no?" Dustin changed his expression to an exaggerated pout, putting on puppy-dog eyes and sticking out his lower lip.

Shane smirked. "Did I say that?"

In response, Shane found himself with his arms full of pale skin and dark hair as Dustin climbed on top of him, straddling his hips. He sighed softy in pleasure as the other boy trailed soft kisses up the side of his neck before reaching his mouth. He parted his lips slightly, and Dustin took advantage of that, as he ran his hands gently down Dustin's back to rest at his waist, holding him in place as their kisses grew more heated, tongues twining together.

When they broke apart for air, it was Dustin smirking then. "You're completely insatiable," he teased, settling down next to his lover and wrapping his arms around him.

Shane ruffled Dustin's hair playfully. "It's all your fault, you know." He stopped for a second to yawn. "And where did you learn words like 'insatiable'?"

Dustin thought for a second. "Uh, Cam sends everybody word-of-the-day e-mails. Something about how he's sick of us all being all 'dude' and 'sick' and 'gnarly' all the time. You don't get them?"

"I don't read e-mail," Shane deadpanned. "Anybody I want to talk to, I see every day anyway."

"Dude, I e-mail you!"

"And I see you every day anyway, don't I? Shut up and kiss me again."

Dustin figured it was always best to comply with leaders' orders.

--


	10. theme 13: Loss

**Notes** - For the PRSW22, set after 'Shane's Karma.'

**Warnings** - Angst, slash, not mine.

theme #13 - loss

In Your Arms (Is Where I Need To Be)

--

Shane sat on the edge of the skate park's half-pipe, staring off into the setting sun. He'd had a long day, and he couldn't put together words to describe exactly how he was feeling now that it was over. One part of him wanted to sit there all night, be alone, and try to process everything. The other part wanted to go to Dustin's house, curl up beside him and take comfort in the embrace of loving arms until he felt slightly more able to process the day's events.

He still hadn't come to a decision an hour later, by the time the stars were out. The sound of somebody else climbing up the side of the ramp drew his attention away from the cacophony of thoughts in his mind. Dustin had made the decision for him.

Shane glanced up, acknowledging the yellow-clad boy's presence with a brief, small, and entirely unconvincing smile.

"Hey," Dustin murmured softly, settling down next to him, not touching, but almost. He'd let Shane bail out of Tori's birthday party at Ninja Ops early, figuring he would want some time alone, but when he had disappeared all afternoon or evening, Dustin had started to suspect that the overly self-critical red ranger might need some company whether or not he actually wanted it. Fortunately, he seemed pretty receptive at that point. "I was worried about you."

"Hey," Shane sighed. "Sorry.. I've just been thinking."

"I figured... You wanna talk about it?" Dustin asked gently. "I mean, you don't have to, but maybe it'd help."

Shane closed his eyes briefly. He actually didn't want to talk about it, because he had no idea what there was to talk about. "I don't know what to say," he admitted. "I couldn't do anything.. and she gave me an incredible gift in return. It doesn't make any sense."

"You saved her from Vexicus," Dustin pointed out. "Twice, even." Shane had shared the whole story with them earlier. "You did everything anyone could possibly do - you helped her fulfill her destiny." He put his arm around Shane's shoulders and the other boy leaned into him, readily accepting the comforting gesture.

"I know, but it still makes me feel a little helpless... I hate that feeling." He paused, trying to rearrange his thoughts. "And... I guess even though it's what had to happen, it's still hard to accept."

"It sucks to meet someone who's different than anybody else you've ever known and then lose them before you even know them at all," Dustin agreed sympathetically. "But nothing here was your fault. Like Sensei said, as long as you keep using the power she gave you to fight for good, she's never really going to be gone."

Shane glanced up into the night sky. "I'm not going to give up. Especially not now."

Dustin nodded slowly, understanding where he was coming from. "You remember, back after that whole mess with Marah, when you told me you'd always be there for me? That goes both ways, you know."

"How could I forget?" Shane smiled slightly. That particular series of events had been a major catalyst for the drastic change in their relationship that he wasn't likely to ever forget, much less anytime soon. "I'll be okay."

"Good. So, not that I don't like the skate park, but can we leave soon?" Dustin pretended to whine. "I don't even want to think about how long you've been moping out here."

"Hasn't been that long," Shane remarked lightly, his lover's words having lifted his spirits somewhat. "After all, you're still orange." The effects of the tanning solution that CyberCam had concocted would take a couple days to wear down to a level that could be considered even reasonably normal, even for a city on the California coast.

"Yeah, yeah. My mom's gonna freak," Dustin grinned. "Wanna crash at your place instead?"

"Why, because my parents won't notice that you look like a piece of fried chicken?"

--


	11. theme 22: Watermelon

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Relatively recent in real-time since I referenced a real person in a couple real events that occurred last winter. :o This is probably the closest to crack I'll get for this series. xD;

**Warnings** - Slash, not mine.

theme #22 - watermelon

Girl Colors (And Boy Colors)

--

Shane wandered through the spectator area of the Blue Bay Harbor motocross track, looking for familiar flashes of crimson, navy, or yellow. They all still wore their colors even though the ranger powers were long-gone. Dustin wasn't at home, wasn't at work, and wasn't at the Academy - so this was really the last place Shane figured was worth checking out.

He ducked under the barriers and climbed up one of the hills next to the track for a better view of more of the course, and noticed two guys on the opposite end of the course that had to be Blake and Hunter. For one thing, the colors were right, and for another, they were going at each other like they were actually racing, and from what Shane could tell, most motocrossers who weren't those two were pretty laid back. They were pretty closely followed by a third figure in pink and black gear, and Shane raised an eyebrow. Tori would want to know if some chick was following Blake around the track.

Shane unzipped his sweatshirt and waved it over his head to get their attention as they came around to where he was standing and pulled off the dirt

"Hey, guys," he greeted as they pulled their helmets off. "You seen Dustin?"

Hunter smirked - Shane noted how disturbing how he'd picked that up from Cam. "Oh man, have we," he commented dryly, as the pink-clad rider pulled up beside them.

"Hey, dude, what's up?" Dustin pulled off the mostly-black helmet. Shane blinked. Okay, that was unexpected. At least he didn't have to go rat out Blake to Tori now.

"Dude... What the hell are you wearing?"

Dustin rolled his eyes. "My mom bought this stuff for my birthday. She said pink's the new black, whatever THAT means."

Blake and Hunter were still snickering. They'd obviously already made fun of Dustin's outfit, but had absolutely no problem with continuing to laugh at him.

Shane shook his head. "Your mom's nuts. I thought you were some girl stalking Blake."

"Hey, I'm not worth stalking?" Hunter grinned.

"Well, I was going to tell Tori. Would Cam even care if some girl was stalking you?"

"Good point." Hunter put his helmet and goggles back on, and motioned to Blake to do the same. "We'll leave you two to discuss this. There's gotta be jokes we haven't thought of yet." Blake laughed and followed his brother back out onto the track.

Dustin shook his head. "Jeez, they didn't laugh when James Stewart rocked the pink gear at supercross last winter."

Shane marginally knew who (and what) Dustin was talking about, since the TV in their apartment was set to Tivo all the motorsports events Dustin could find on Speed or CBS. "Uh, you're not a five-eight black man, dude," he observed. "Not that I have a problem with that or anything, but you look like a watermelon Blow-Pop."

Dustin laughed. "So, you wanna see how many licks it takes to get to the center?"

--

A/N: I'm aware that the reference is actually applicable to Tootsie-Roll pops. I just didn't wanna keep writing this and I don't think those come in flavors. xD Why does Shane keep comparing Dustin to food? I'm going to need to explore that further. xD;


	12. theme 4: Commitment

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Post-series, pre-'Go Big,' since the boys were mentioned living together in that one. (I've actually got a working timeline for this series now, and it's so far from the order they're written in, it ain't even funny. :D)

**Warnings** - Slash, not mine. Basically a PWP. Uh, I've never written porn before. Well, that's not true, I wrote some Xena femslash when I was twelve. But that was awful and doesn't count, IMO. This is the edited version for FFN - the whole thing's on the PRSW22 comm on LJ.

theme #4 - commitment

Going Out (Staying In)

--

Shane stumbled tiredly into his room in the Academy's teachers' quarters. This was getting ridiculous. Up at sunrise every day, and when he wasn't teaching or dealing with students, Cam was enlisting his help with logistical issues regarding getting the school back to normal. Teaching full-time was great, but he was beginning to seriously regret choosing to live at the school.

It didn't help that Tori and Dustin both decided to stay at home. Not only was he the only one subjected to sixteen-hour workdays because he didn't have the trip back to Blue Bay Harbor each night, but aside from the occasional stolen kisses behind the weapons tent during lunch hour and a night here or there that Dustin would sleep over, he hadn't had any time to spend with his lover in weeks.

He sighed, stripping off his uniform and collapsing on the bed. It'd be nice if this was one of those nights, he reflected, but Dustin had left for home a few hours ago - Mrs. Brooks complained when he wasn't home for dinner. Shane had an open invitation to join them, but since Cam had asked him to teach an evening class, he usually didn't have the time.

Despite being too exhausted to do anything, it was still nice to fall asleep with the comforting warmth of another person next to you, Shane thought. And he had found that waking up to the sight of Dustin's warm brown eyes was the surest way to make him smile all day.

At least it was Friday, this weekend he didn't have to take any of the students on retreats in the mountains, and Dustin didn't have anything motocross-related to do. The idea of uninterrupted free time without students around to bother them would have probably kept Shane awake with anticipation if he wasn't so exhausted. But it had been a long day - hell, a long week - and he shut his eyes in the darkness and enjoyed the cool breeze from the open window as he drifted off to sleep.

--

As Shane woke up, he noticed two things. One, the sun coming in the window meant that it was a lot later than he'd meant to wake up - that was a westward-facing wall - and two, there was somebody else in his bed, and he was pretty sure that wasn't right. He muttered something unintelligible in a vaguely inquiring tone.

"You've definitely been working too much, dude."

Shane rubbed at his eyes. "... What time is it?" He yawned.

"About noon," Dustin replied. "I came over after breakfast, but I didn't wanna wake you up."

"Mmm." Shane sighed lazily and pulled the other boy back down. "Thanks. No time to sleep this week." He made a pleased sound as he felt warm lips on his neck.

Dustin smiled. "So staying in bed is definitely on the agenda for today?" he whispered. The response he got was a pair of insistent hands yanking his t-shirt up over his head. "I'm starting to think you don't wanna go out today.."

Shane tossed the shirt across the room and caught his partner's inviting lips in a long, slow kiss, deepening the contact until Dustin had to pull back to wriggle the rest of the way out of his jeans and underwear. "We can go out later," he noted breathlessly.

"Absolutely," Dustin agreed, reaching into Shane's shorts to stroke hard flesh while he bit down on the junction between neck and shoulder. He was rewarded with a soft moan, and smirked against the dark skin.

"If you give me a hickey, I'm gonna kill you," Shane gasped, but it was pretty difficult to sound threatening while somebody was giving you a handjob. He reached down to pull his boxer shorts down over his hips, and Dustin used his free hand to yank them the rest of the way off.

"Your uniform's got a high collar," Dustin remarked, his eyes sparkling. "I'm sure you'll get over it pretty quick." The thought popped into his mind that maybe the first time they'd had time for making love in - however long it'd been, he wasn't even sure - probably wasn't the best time to be a tease, and figured maybe using his mouth for more interesting purposes might be the right idea.

--

"What were you saying about quick?" Shane asked, smirking slightly.

Dustin snorted. "Shut up, dude. Maybe if it hadn't been, like, two or three weeks..."

"I agree. This schedule is killer."

"Yeah, dude, but it's not like there's anything to be done about it," Dustin sighed, resting his head on Shane's chest, snuggling up close.

"Maybe not," Shane sighed, petting the mop of messy dark hair. "But I have been thinking.."

"Yeah?"

"You could move in here with me," he suggested tentatively. "I mean, I dunno why you didn't wanna live at the Academy to begin with when Sensei made us instructors, so if it's something about that we could get a place in town..." He stopped for a second, trying not to start rambling. It occurred to him that he never did that before he and Dustin had gotten together. "I just... Waking up with you here, the awesome sex notwithstanding, it's ..." And the rambling was kicking in again. He tried again, going for simple this time. "I miss having time to spend with you."

Dustin blinked, tilting his head to study Shane's face. "Dude, all it was is that my mom wanted me to stay home. I don't mind this place - and I totally get what you mean about waking up together." He grinned. "But I think my mom will get over it if I tell her I'm moving out to go live with my boyfriend at the secret ninja school we're teachers at." Neither his relationship with Shane or his profession at the Academy were secrets to his mother, but phrased like that it was probably enough to shock anybody for at least a little while.

"So... That's a yes?" Shane asked.

Dustin laughed. "Yeah, dude. I thought I'm supposed to be the airhead."

--


	13. theme 14: Laughter

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Uh, takes place during the series as opposed to the Dustin-birthday in "Girl Colors" which was a few years post-series. XD Title is from "You Are The Music In Me" from HSM2. This got a little more cracky than I wanted it to as a result of it being unusually hard to write. xD;

**Warnings** - Slash, not mine.

theme #13 - laughter

A Little Laughter (Or Happy Ever After)

--

It was Dustin's birthday, and Shane was wondering absently why it was always his job to get birthday cakes while he stood in the unnaturally long line at the supermarket. Blake and Hunter had been roped into helping Tori and Kelly decorate Storm Chargers, though, and the way Tori ordered him to go get the cake had sent him running as fast as possible. Girls were scary when they were planning things.

"God help Blake if he and Tori ever get married," he muttered under his breath.

Shane got back to the store shortly after 3:00, glad that at least Dustin was consistent in being late for work - he probably wouldn't show up for another fifteen minutes. Kelly had purposely scheduled him to work so the others could throw him a surprise party - Shane had to listen to him complain about having to work on his birthday for the past week, and he'd been tempted more than once to tell his boyfriend the truth just to shut him up.

Blake and Hunter had done a decent job, Shane noted - in making a complete mess of Kelly's store. Balloons and streamers were tossed pretty much everywhere, and if he wasn't mistaken, they had thrown yellow glitter all over the floor. That could not have been Tori's idea.

"Uh, why is there glitter on the floor?" He asked, setting the cake box down on the short table in the little alcove by the register.

Tori rolled her eyes. "Because Hunter is a five-year-old."

"And he's staying late to clean it up!" Kelly shouted from the back room. She was taking inventory, and now that the decorating - if it could be called that - was done, Blake was hanging out behind the counter, in case any customers showed up. For the most part, the store's regular clientele was a pretty laid-back crowd, which was how they could get away with this to begin with.

"It'll come up when you vacuum!" Hunter shouted back.

"No, it'll come up when YOU vacuum." Kelly walked out carrying a crate of things to be put on display. "Last time I checked, I was paying you for something."

Hunter batted his eyelashes. "I thought that's just because I'm so pretty."

Tori groaned. Blake threw a prepackaged air filter at his brother's head. Shane laughed. Before Kelly could respond, the door flew open, and Dustin came running in, backpack thrown over one shoulder, already apologizing for being late - before he slipped on all the glitter and fell over a display of wakeboards.

Kelly shook her head. "It's a good thing I didn't actually intend for you to work today."

Shane helped Dustin scramble up off the floor. "Well, happy birthday, at any rate."

"Dude, there's glitter all over the floor... why?"

"Tori let Hunter decorate," Blake said, snickering. "We did the normal stuff like the balloons."

Dustin blinked. "So, wait, I'm not actually late?"

"Well, you are. But for your birthday party instead of work," Shane explained.

"Way to go, dude," Hunter added.

After they got the wakeboard display that Dustin had fallen over put back together, Kelly took over the register so Blake could join them. Cam finally showed up during the display-fixing fun, claiming he'd lost track of time while doing computer upgrades.

"So, presents or cake first?" Hunter wanted to know.

"I vote presents," Kelly volunteered. "You guys will need the energy from the sugar rush to clean up after closing." She shot a pointed glance at Hunter, prompting Cam to look at him accusingly as well.

"Hey, no ganging up on me," he protested.

Dustin grinned. "I'm gonna go with Kelly on this one."

"Awesome." Hunter grabbed a box off the floor by the side of the couch and tossed it at Dustin. "This is from Blake and me."

"For the record, I had very little say in that," Blake added. "I just happened to be on the same shopping trip."

Dustin grinned, tore the paper off the haphazardly-wrapped box, and opened it. "Uh..."

"Is that a stuffed lion riding a Harley?" Shane asked, scratching his head.

"Dude, there's this awful place in the mall in Reefside that sells all kinds of stuff like that," Hunter said, as though that was an explanation.

"Okay, dude... Uh, thanks?" Dustin set what had to be the weirdest toy he'd ever owned on the table.

Cam pulled a thin package out of his backpack and handed it to Dustin. "Moving on," he deadpanned. "Don't think this means I condone you playing video games on my computer, though."

Dustin grinned and ripped the paper off. "MX Unleashed for Playstation! Dude, awesome!" He flipped the game box over to look at the back. "Oh, man, this looks so sweet. I read on the 'net that they made some of the freestyle tricks mad realistic."

"Wonderful, now we're never going to see him again," Tori said, shaking her head. "You do know you can do that stuff for real if you go outside, right?"

"Nobody ever broke their neck playing a video game," Shane countered. "Besides, video games are good for your hand-eye coordination, or whatever."

"Or whatever," Tori mimicked. "Here, this is from Kelly." She slid a decorative gift bag across the floor. Dustin dug around in the tissue paper and pulled out a black and yellow motocross jersey with his name and number screenprinted on the back.

"Hey, Kel, this is awesome!"

"Well, I sponsor you, right? You have to look good." She leaned on the counter, a smile on her face. "It's not completely altruistic."

Dustin scratched his head. "Uh, what's 'altruistic' mean?"

"It means that next year, I'm getting you a dictionary," Cam said.

"Dude... What?"

"Never mind, Dustin." Tori tossed another gift bag at him, this one smaller. "This is from me, and has nothing to do with motorcycles."

Dustin eyed the bag warily. "It's not gonna, like, explode or bite me or something, is it?"

"How do you get THAT from 'has nothing to do with motorcycles'?" Shane asked.

Tori sighed. "Oh, just open it. At least it's not that "I'm not gay but my boyfriend is" t-shirt that we had to talk Hunter out of getting for you."

"That was funny," Hunter pouted. Cam gave him a glare that very openly read, 'Don't even think about it,' and he pouted some more.

Dustin eyed the stuffed lion again, wondered how many other weird ideas of Hunter's that Tori and the others had vetoed, and looked in the bag. "Uh, Tor, thanks, but I already have a watch."

Tori raised an eyebrow. "You broke it at the track," she reminded him.

Dustin blinked. "No I didn't." He glanced at his left wrist. Where the hell was his watch, anyway?

"Yeah, you did, dude.. It was like, a year ago." Shane punched him in the shoulder. "It was, like, the one time you ever remembered to wear it."

"Uh, why don't I remember this?" Dustin scratched his head absently.

"Dustin, we all ask ourselves that about you on a regular basis," Cam remarked, prompting more snickering from Blake and Hunter.

Meanwhile, Kelly was watching from behind the counter, trying to keep a straight face as she listened to the exchange. She supposed she was unreasonably attached to this ragtag group of kids, but they were a good bunch - even Blake and Hunter, once they'd worked out whatever issues they had going on.

Once they were all done making fun of Dustin for the long-forgotten broken watch, Shane took a small box out of his jacket pocket and handed it over. He'd drawn a total blank on the 'things to get your boyfriend for his birthday' brainstorming. Dustin opened it and lifted out a black leather cord with a pendant made of a lightweight yellow-tinted metal in the shape of a downward-pointed triangle with a horizontal line through the middle. He blinked, recognizing it as the alchemical symbol for his ninja element, and grinned widely.

"Man, where'd you even find this?"

"You like it?" Shane looked relieved. "Tori pointed me to this new age shop downtown."

"No doubt." Dustin pulled it over his head, and looked up to catch Shane's gaze briefly. "Thanks, dude." Shane smiled.

Hunter cleared his throat. "So, are we gonna eat now, or are we gonna wait until after you guys make out?"

Kelly made a mental note to have a talk with Hunter about discretion later. Shane took the more direct route of kicking him in the shin.

--


	14. theme 15: Peace

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. Takes place during the Operation Overdrive episode "Once A Ranger," last in the continuity of this fic-series as of this writing.

**Warnings** - Slash, not mine.

theme #15 - peace.

Back to Action (On The Home Front)

--

The Academy classes had the day off, and since sunrise meditation was optional for instructors when there was no class, Shane and Dustin were taking the random chance to sleep in. Which was all well and good, except that there was a really repetitive, annoying sound coming from the main area of the apartment. Dustin wasn't sure what it was, because he was pretty sure he was asleep, at least until Shane elbowed him in the ribs.

"Get off me so I can answer the door."

"Huh?" Dustin mumbled incoherently.

"Dude. The door?"

Finally it registered in Dustin's sleep-fogged brain that the annoying knocking sound was probably someone at the door, and that was why Shane kept talking about it. He detached himself from Shane and rolled over, pulling the covers with him, and grabbed onto a pillow instead.

Shane sighed and sat up, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed, pulled a pair of shorts off the floor, and pulled them up around his waist as he stood up. He yawned and scratched the back of his head as he padded out of the bedroom, across the tiny apartment to the door.

"Guys! Wake up!" Someone was shouting now, in addition to the knocking, and Shane knew he had to be tired because it sounded kind of like Tori. He wasn't sure what time it was, but he was pretty sure Tori was supposed to be at work. The shouting continued. "It is way too late to still be in bed! Get up, it's important!" That was definitely Tori. Shane pulled the door open.

"What's going on?" He asked, rubbing his eyes tiredly. Not even five years of ninja training would make him a morning person, but he was thankful to be more together than Dustin was when he woke up. "What's important?"

Tori took in her friend's state of undress and rolled her eyes. "You could have put a shirt on," she said, coming into the apartment, and Shane shut the door behind her and turned around. She had a backpack on her back and a blue duffel bag with her.

"Yeah, I know, sorry. We were up late. What's so important?" Shane asked again. "Are you going on a trip or something?

"You guys are always up late." Tori shook her head. "I'll explain in a minute, you're never going to believe what happened to me this morning, it's unbelievable. Is Dustin still asleep? He should hear this too."

Shane snorted. "Uh, yeah, good luck with that, Tor."

"Dustin!" Tori shouted, turning on her heel to go into the bedroom. "Wake up!" Shane shook his head. She would have no problem with hauling him out of bed naked and throwing cold water on him, and Shane really didn't want to deal with cleaning up after that. He followed her into the bedroom, where she had taken out her cell phone and was playing a ringtone directly in his ear.

"I'm awake, I'm awake," Dustin was groaning. "Stop it already, what are you waking me up for?"

"Number one, it's eleven o'clock in the morning on a weekday," Tori said, "Even if you have the day off you can do something productive. Number two, I need to tell you guys something."

Dustin sat up and rubbed his eyes, pulling the sheet up around his hips when he remembered he was undressed. "What's up?"

Shane stood up straight suddenly, as he finally noticed Tori's left wrist "You're wearing your morpher," he said, "Did we seriously miss something on the one day we slept in all month?"

"That's part of what I have to tell you," Tori replied. "It's pretty crazy, actually. This morning, I was getting ready to go open up the shop, and when I opened the drawer of my dresser for a hair tie, this thing was glowing." She gestured to the morpher. "I thought I was seriously tweaked or something. When I picked it up, this holographic image of a guy in gold armor appeared from it."

Dustin shoved some of his messy hair out of his face and scratched at his head. "Dude, just appeared out of nowhere? That's creepy."

"Yeah, well, get this. You guys have seen the TV news about the new Power Rangers in San Angeles, right? Operation Overdrive?" Tori asked, and the guys nodded. "Well. This being, the Sentinel Knight, is the one who prompted their... I don't know, their mentor or boss or whatever he is, to gather them to begin with."

"So, what does this have to do with you?" Shane asked.

"I'm getting to that." Tori took a deep breath. "Their powers have been damaged by a new enemy, and so the Sentinel Knight wants some of us who've been Rangers in the past to step in as their temporary replacements, until they can figure out how to get their powers back."

"Uh, okay, so I'm seeing a major problem here." Dustin scratched his head quizzically. "Our powers are gone too. What do they want you to do?"

Tori held up her wrist with the morpher strapped on. "The Sentinel Knight was able to restore my powers for this mission. Don't ask how, because I don't know, and don't get paranoid, because I already checked it with Cam AND Sensei before I came to see you guys."

Dustin looked thoughtful for a moment. "Okay, but if this Knight guy can restore your powers, why can't he just, like, give these other guys their powers back too? And why does he only want you to go, anyway?"

"Didn't I just say I don't know?" Tori asked impatiently. "Anyway, the actual reason I'm here is because I need help to keep the shop open while I'm gone. I really don't know how long this is going to take."

"What do you need us to do?" Shane asked. "Normally we've got classes and stuff, but we can probably change some things around."

"Cam said he'd take some of your class loads and redistribute them among other instructors," Tori said. "I've got a couple of kids who come in and work at the busier times, and they're pretty reliable, but I need someone to fill in the gaps when I'm usually there by myself. Just open the place up each day, keep it relatively orderly, and lock up each night?"

"Yeah, Tor, we can pull that off, I guess." Dustin yawned.

"Great." Tori pulled a large set of keys and a binder out of the backpack she was carrying and handed them off to Shane. "That's got my employees' contact info and their usual schedule in it, along with the codes for the security system, instructions for the inventory software on the computer, and pretty much all the other information. Don't worry, the kids know how to do inventory, you don't have to."

Dustin looked visibly relieved.

"Okay, well, I'm off then." Tori got up and picked up the duffel bag from the floor. "Wish me luck, you guys, and please call me if there's any problems. I really don't want to come back and find my store burnt down or something."

"Hey, Storm Chargers is still standing and I worked there for like, two years," Dustin pointed out. "And Kelly went on vacation a couple of times!"

Shane grinned. "We'll take care of it, Tor."

--

"Hey, dude, what is "Surf Wax" even for?" Dustin asked, while he was putting some new inventory up on the shelves.

Shane looked up from the magazine he was reading. "I'm pretty sure it's so you don't slip off the board as easily," he replied. "You've seen Tori waxing surfboards for years and you never asked?"

Dustin shrugged. "I dunno, it never came up." He tossed a bar of wax in the air and caught it again, holding it up. "Hey, you think if I put this stuff on the seat of my bike, it'll make it less slippery, like, in rain and mud?"

Shane raised an eyebrow. "Don't they make something like that for motocross?"

"Well, there's gripper tape." Dustin looked thoughtful for a moment and then cringed. "And then there was that time I sprayed silicon spray on my bike seat, though, and that sucked hardcore."

"Yeah, I remember that." Shane shook his head. "I love you to death, but I have no idea what you were thinking that day. Putting strange substances on your bike hasn't worked in the past, so maybe the surfboard wax isn't a great idea."

"You're probably right." Dustin put the block of wax he'd been tossing around up onto the shelf with the rest. He made a mental note to ask Tori about it when she got back anyway, though, since Shane knew almost as much about surfboards as he did about motocross, which even after four years of living with Dustin, could maybe fill a teacup on a good day.

--

"I'm telling you, Tori, everything's absolutely fine here," Shane said into the mouthpiece of the phone. He was standing behind the front counter of Tori's shop, watching Dustin chase a live chicken around the racks of clothing and equipment. "We're all good."

"Are you sure?" Tori sounded skeptical. She'd been gone for five weeks,, which was a lot longer than she'd been expecting. "There's an awful lot of noise going on."

"Absolutely sure." Shane glanced across the store where Dustin had cornered the loose chicken. "Oh, hey, I gotta go," he finished hastily, "There's, ah, customers. Bye, Tor!"

--

Tori settled into the chair in her small living room, pleased to finally be back at home. "So, did you guys learn anything about the lovely world of retail management while I was gone?"

"Uh.." Dustin scratched his head. "Livestock and employee birthday parties are a bad combination?"

"Let's just gloss right over exactly what you mean by that."

Shane cleared his throat. "Yeah, that might be a good idea." He shot an annoyed look at Dustin, who grinned sheepishly. "So, what was it like, anyway? Meeting the other Rangers, being back in the thick of it again?"

Tori grinned. "Well, seeing Kira again was pretty awesome - you remember her, right, from the team in Reefside?" Shane and Dustin exchanged an amused glance and nodded. Like they could forget the Dino Thunder team. "The others were really great too. There was Xander, who manages a record shop in Briarwood, and Adam, who was part of one of the original Ranger teams back in Angel Grove almost fifteen years ago!" She paused and took a deep breath. "I haven't even hit the coolest part yet. The Red Ranger, Bridge, was from, like, 20 years in the future. They actually had him come back in time, this was so important."

"Wow, that sounds incredible." Shane wasn't sure if he should be envious or not - it had been a few years since their final battle as Rangers, and he didn't miss it nearly as much as he used to, but Tori's description was making him nostalgic.

"Yeah, really," Dustin agreed. "I wish we could have gone too. Peace is kind of overrated. Don't get me wrong, I'm totally glad Lothor's gone," he grinned sideways at Shane and squeezed his hand, "and I'm happy with my life and everything..."

"You just miss it sometimes," Shane finished the thought for him. "I know. It was the same for me - not so often anymore, though."

Tori nodded in agreement. "I think all former Rangers had the same problem. Even the ones who still have their powers."

"Do that many still have them?" Dustin asked.

"Well, there's a kind of call list for former Rangers with active powers in case of a serious crisis," Tori explained. "Dr. Oliver, the teacher who created the Dino Rangers' powers? He maintains it. Kira said that Cam has stayed in touch with him in case they ever need the Academy's help, too."

"So we're still on-call even without our powers, I guess." Dustin grinned. "I can totally live with that."

"And I can totally live with getting back to normal," Shane said, standing up to stretch. "Which includes meditation at sunrise before classes whether we like it or not, so we should get home."

Dustin grumbled but got up as well. "Right, right. A sensei's work is never done."

"Not as long as you're blessed with students exactly like yourself, Dustin," Tori joked, following them to the door of her apartment. "Good night, you guys. Thanks so much for all your help."

"Yeah, no prob, Tor." Shane gave her a hug as they were leaving, and Dustin followed suit. "Welcome home."

They piled into the front seat of the old box van Dustin drove around, which had been creatively painted on each side with a logo of a movie-style ninja doing a trick on a yellow motocross bike. "You know," Shane commented, when Dustin finally succeeded at turning the ignition over on the third try, "I don't think peace is overrated at all."

"Yeah?" Dustin asked, shifting the van into first gear to pull out of the parking space. "Why?"

"Because the peace we have now, we earned," Shane said slowly, looking out the window at the dark night sky. "We worked hard for it and because of that we can have the lives that we do, together."

Dustin was silent for a few moments, absorbing the words. Shane had gotten increasingly philosophical over the past few years and Dustin found he appreciated it more when he understood it. He smiled, and reached over to take Shane's hand when they stopped at the light at the end of Tori's block. "Yeah. I can definitely see that."

--


	15. theme 3: Children

**Notes** - For the PRSW22. The post-"Thunder Storm" fic I was TRYING to write with 'peace' but it turned into this, which puts it between 'commitment' and 'thrill' respectively on my fic timeline. Finished after I ran out of ideas for the SPD gift!fic I'm writing. Ah well.

**Warnings** - Slash, not mine.

theme #3 - children

Home Again (And Looking to the Future)

--

Shane collapsed onto the small couch in their apartment at the Academy's instructor dormitory. "Well, I'm pretty sure we can never go back to Hayley's Cyberspace, but I think this whole thing could have gone worse."

"I dunno, dude, she was pretty cool about us trashing her place," Dustin said, still standing by the doorway flipping absently through a new issue of a motocross magazine that had shown up in their P.O. Box in town while they were away. "I mean, once she knew what was actually going on, anyway. It's not like it was our fault or anything."

"Yeah, but I'm pretty sure none of her customers knew what was going on. We got a few pretty weird looks at the race track." Shane knew they looked at least somewhat different in their ninja uniforms than in their civilian clothes, but they hadn't been wearing head coverings at the time, there had been an awful lot of people in the cyber cafe when they'd burst in looking for the Dino Rangers, and most of Reefside was all about the gossip that surrounded the weird goings-on of recent months.

"Hey, man, you were pretty hardcore on those surveillance tapes Hayley showed us." Dustin flipped the magazine shut and tossed it on the countertop. "They so knew we could totally kick their butts."

"Yeah, but who'd have guessed that Eric McKnight's twin brother is a Ranger?" Shane asked sardonically. He still couldn't believe it himself. "That kid flunked out of here in like, what, a couple of months?"

"He wasn't that bad.." Dustin had been against the boy's dismissal from the Academy, on the basis that if it wasn't for misfit students being given a second chance, the school wouldn't be standing, but he'd been very narrowly outvoted. "I think that whole group just, like, only practiced enough that only one of them could be good on any given day."

"Maybe so." Shane laughed. "A lot of the new kids are more enthusiastic than the old ones, though. I'd expect some of my more advanced students to put more into their training."

"Yeah, well, maybe it's cause they were trapped in those bubble things on Lothor's ship for like, eleven months." Dustin plopped down next to him on the couch and propped his feet up on the large, worn footstool that doubled as a coffee table."Meanwhile the new ones are all hyped up 'cause there was just practically an intergalactic war in their backyard."

Shane's expression fell abruptly at Dustin's mention of the captive ninjas - many of whom had been their friends and classmates before the attacks. Not all of them had opted to return to the Academy after their rescue and Lothor's defeat, but even though a majority had come back, many still suffered from varying degrees of emotional problems due to the months spent in interdimensional captivity.

"Sorry, dude, didn't mean to bum you out," Dustin continued, noticing that his lover was obviously distressed by the statement, "But it's the truth." He was sort of surprised that Shane hadn't figured that part out for himself.

Shane sighed. "I know. It's just not great to hear. I still think if I had done better we could have rescued them sooner."

Dustin tried to refrain from rolling his eyes. "Dude, it wasn't you. It was Tori and Blake and Hunter and Cam and me AND you, all together, and we did the best we could." He slid closer on the couch so he could snuggle up against Shane's side. "And do you really think Sensei would have told us we did good if it wasn't true?"

"I know, but -" Shane was going to say something before Dustin cut him off with a kiss as soon as the word 'but' was past his lips.

"No buts, bro." Dustin said solemnly. "All our students have a future because of us." He laid his head down on Shane's shoulder and hugged him tightly. "You included. Now, for somebody with an ego the size of San Angeles, you get way too critical of yourself, so will you let it go already?"

Shane couldn't help smiling a bit, and wrapped his arms around Dustin tightly, nuzzling the mop of dark hair that rested against his neck. "Sorry. I guess sometimes I still need reminding."

--


End file.
